To Stalk and Protect
by Arhtea
Summary: Written for QLFC season 6 Finals. "I have this theory," Potter replied. "A theory that these people had been sent by Lord Voldemort to murder Hermione Granger and that you stalked and killed them to stop them from completing their jobs." "And what do you intend to do with this theory?" the man asked. "Use it to coerce you into working with me, of course."


**Team: **Pride of Portree

**Round:** **This or That**

**Position: **Keeper

**Keeper's Prompt:** pairing Draco/Harry

**Word count: 2848**

**Beta love to: Story Please, Cescalia, Ebenbild and Crochetaway**

**And lots and lots of love to the whole Pride of Portree team for a wonderful season! You're the best 3**

**AU where Lord Voldemort is the head of an organized crime family in the Wizarding World. Hence no final battle and alternative careers for characters. Also no real blood prejudice exists, so the characters have been adjusted accordingly. **

**The story is a sort of a continuation of For Love Not Hate.**

* * *

**To Stalk and Protect**

The prisoner stirred as the shadow of his visitor fell on him. He brushed away a bit of filthy blond hair to get a better look, but the light coming from the outside blinded him. For a long while the figure just stood there and looked down at him. Then they pulled the door open and stepped into the cell.

"We need to talk," he stated and the light shifted, illuminating his face and revealing him as Auror Potter, the head of the taskforce working to take down Lord Voldemort's crime syndicate.

The prisoner let out a humorless bark of laughter. Potter wasn't the first one who had come to talk. There had been others. Others very displeased to learn that the man who had tried to kill Hermione Granger, a high accuser of the Wizengamot, was alive after all. Well, he used the term 'talk' loosely. Mostly, the others had been interested in something of a more violent nature, rather than actually trying to extract information. If they _had _tried, they might have learned the truth of how he'd faked his death in order to protect Hermione. But they hadn't. They were too busy using violence to satisfy their anger.

He had no reason to believe one of Hermione's closest friends would want anything different so he kept his mouth shut. Potter stepped closer and instinctively the man moved to shield his face from the blows that were sure to come. They didn't.

Instead a picture was thrown at his feet. The prisoner reached out for it carefully and examined the stern face of Thorfinn Rowle. "What is this?" he asked, his voice hoarse from lack of use.

"We found him buried in a shallow grave in the park near Horizont Alley." Near Hermione's home. "He's been strangled to death."

Of course he knew. He'd been the one to slip the wire around the bastard's neck. And so it appeared, did Potter, for two more pictures followed. He didn't have to pick them up to know they'd be of Rabastan Lestrange and Barty Crouch Junior. He squinted, trying to look at Potter and see his expression. "What do you want with me?"

"I have this theory," Potter replied. "A theory that these people had been sent by Lord Voldemort to murder Hermione Granger and that you stalked and killed them to stop them from completing their jobs."

"And what do you intend to do with this theory?" the man asked.

"Use it to coerce you into working with me, of course."

Of course. Just like bloody Saint Potter to clearly state his intentions to blackmail someone and somehow appear superior in the situation. Draco Malfoy drew himself up a little higher. "And what might you need me for?"

"I want to go after your aunt; Bellatrix Lestrange," the man replied. "Three nights ago she and her husband showed up at Longbottom Manor. They sought to kill Neville. He wasn't home but his parents were. Both of them are at St. Mungo's but the prognosis isn't good."

"So?" Malfoy asked, trying hard to mask the true emotions in his voice. He knew of Auror Longbottom, of course, and his family, they were rather rich and influential, though most of the power was in the hands of the matriarch Augusta. He spared them a thought but more because they were related to Bellatrix's growing madness than out of true compassion.

Potter seemed to read his mind. "Bellatrix has been rising in the ranks recently. She's vicious, like a rabid dog. The new intel says she only has one more task to prove her worth and be accepted in the inner circle. She must do what everyone else has failed at so far — kill Hermione. Based on these pictures, you don't want that. And I don't either."

Draco stared back blankly, hoping against hope that his face didn't show how his insides clenched thinking of Hermione being confronted by Bellatrix. Hermione, who was now seven months pregnant with his child. He felt sick as he thought what the demented older witch might do to her. To them both. He weighed Potter's words. He had no reason to suspect that Potter was trying to trick him. His relationship with Hermione was one of deep affection and friendship. So deep that it even made Draco's insides sometimes swell with jealousy, wishing desperately to be in Potter's place. He also knew Potter would never work with Lord Voldemort. No riches in the world would get him to side with the man that had brutally butchered his parents when he was an infant.

Finally Draco nodded. "What shall we do then?"

Auror Potter smiled as he offered Draco a hand. "We are going to set a trap!"

* * *

Three hours, a good shower, and a haircut later, Malfoy was feeling a bit less sure about the plan. There was mostly the problem of Potter not trusting him. That was to say, he at least trusted Malfoy in as far as believing he shared the desire to protect Hermione. However, he still also remembered his school days at Hogwarts, where they had occupied their time engaged in petty feuds. Malfoy had thought he had forgotten about them himself, until Potter walked in on him as he showered, wand casually in hand, and Draco leapt out of the way like a cornered animal. Potter had reacted with genuine horror and tried to apologize, which had resulted in Draco slamming the door in his face.

Then there was the fact that they didn't really have a plan. He would have liked it if Potter had at least thought things through before using his rank as the leader of a task force to sign a dangerous criminal out of jail.

After a while, though, they somehow managed to agree on a stakeout as the best strategy. At seven in the evening, for better or for worse, they were both perched on a rooftop waiting for Hermione to finish her day and come home. Apparently, the witch was determined to work for as long as possible, even if it meant having the baby in the middle of a courtroom.

Hermione was late, as always, so Draco and Potter sat in an uncomfortable silence and stared at her apartment building. That silence forced all the thoughts he'd pushed away earlier into Draco's head (remarkably easy to do as one occupies oneself with killing people or being beaten by angry Aurors). They forced him to confront his feelings about the witch he was lying in wait for yet again.

But how could he confront what he felt about a witch in whose attic he'd lived for the past few months, quietly killing to protect her? While at the time that had seemed the best way to take care of the assassins Lord Voldemort sent to deal with the high accuser working on his case, when he put it into thoughts, it sounded rather stalkerish and he was sure that would be how Hermione would see it. Breaking through her wards to gain access to her apartment and silently guard her had seemed a good idea at the time. It had allowed him to avert a number of attempts on her life. However, looking back at it, he was starting to think there could have been better, less creepy ways to guard her life.

He also knew he'd begun doing this because of one past night of infatuation and a baby he'd felt responsible for. And now? He'd spent all those months learning about her. He felt he knew her. He realized that he _wanted _to know her.

Draco was roused from his thoughts by Potter elbowing him. "Quit dreaming, we have movement!" He motioned at the street and Draco saw Hermione. Behind her in the darkness, stood Bellatrix. Hermione's usual Aurors, who'd been tasked with shadowing her, were gone. Without thinking, Draco fired off a spell at Bellatrix, even as he heard Potter vaguely whisper something at him.

The spell missed and Bellatrix spun on her heels, firing a spell back. Draco conjured a shield and then leapt at Bellatrix. It was a glorious leap...right up to the point where his feet hit the ground and he saw stars. He'd missed Bellatrix by meters and given time for her to fire another spell, this time at Hermione. It struck the witch, who had turned to face her attacker and the spell grazed her, a wound splitting open on her arm. She screamed.

Potter fired a spell at Bellatrix, followed by Draco and the deranged woman fled. Draco pulled himself to his feet and forced himself to run after her, trying to trip her with a spell. They ran through the maze of streets—Bellatrix just slightly ahead of him and Draco just barely missing his aunt. The woman turned a corner and as Draco neared it, he heard the sharp crack of apparition. She was gone.

Cursing, Draco remembered Hermione. He cursed again and rushed back towards Horizont Alley. He nearly made it there.

"Petrificus Totalus!" whispered a voice from behind him and Draco collapsed on his face. A sharp kick in the side flipped him over and he saw Auror Potter's angry face.

"What the fuck, Malfoy?" Potter hissed. "You tipped her off that we were watching and you let her get away!" He drew his foot back and kicked Draco hard in the side. "They told me that you were working for Lord Voldemort still, that this was some sort of a trap and I told them they were wrong," he kicked Draco again, "And now that bitch knows!"

Draco tried to speak through the curse but couldn't. He could only stare up at the man and wonder what the hell had come over him. Potter had shown signs of instability in his decision making at Hogwarts and some bursts of anger but this was something else. He focused on all the training Snape had given him and tried to wandlessly cast a counterspell. After the fourth kick and fifth try, he succeeded, leapt up from the ground and went for Potter's throat.

"What the fuck is _your _problem?" he hissed. "I saw my opportunity and I took it. You were supposed to have my back."

"I can't have your back, you asshole, if you don't follow the plan."

"The plan was to get Bellatrix and that's what I tried to do!"

"Well, did you get her then? Or did you just tip her off that we were here?!" Potter roared. "Everyone else thought you were there to kill her again and I just had to believe that I was wrong about you just as I was wrong about Snape at Hogwarts! And now you left Hermione bleeding on the ground to help your aunt get away!"

At the mention of Hermione, Draco let go and took a step back. "Hermione? How…how is she? Is she alright? Is the baby—"

"The _baby_? What the hell do you care if the baby's alright?" Potter spat.

"Because it's mine!" Draco cried out in frustration.

* * *

What followed was the most awkward cup of tea that Draco had ever had. There were certain revelations in the world that had the ability to either unleash the fury of a thousand hordes or to force one to forget everything and just stand and gape. Potter had chosen the latter. Draco had to physically drag him away to a small, out of sight, all-night coffee shop. He then ensured that Potter had, before his fit of rage, sent for an ambulance. Hermione had already been taken away, so Draco slunk back and bought them both a strong coffee.

After his third cup, Potter regained his ability to speak. "How?"

Draco gave him a sour smile. "Well, Potter, has someone given you the "birds and bees" talk already?"

Potter kicked at his feet under the table. "Shut up, git. I still haven't decided you're not in fact just a murderer but a traitor to boot!"

Draco actually felt a stab of hurt at that but swallowed it. It was ridiculous to be feeling hurt because of what _Potter _thought. Or perhaps that was just a side-effect of beginning to fall for Hermione. If so, he didn't care for it. Nevertheless, he realized he had to give Potter something to convince him that his theory was right. That when the Aurors had picked him up for loitering around Hermione's apartment, he was really there to protect the woman, no matter how unbelievable it sounded. "We met at one of Father's parties. A masked ball. She doesn't know." He supposed he didn't either. Not for sure. But he'd been with Hermione at about the right time and as far as he knew, she didn't have other men in her life. "After that, I was given the task to kill her but I just couldn't do it. So I chose to protect her instead. Protect them both."

Potter eyed him suspiciously. Then he finally made a non-committal noise. "She mentioned she went. To mingle with the enemy." He downed his fourth cup. "If I believe you, of course!"

"Oh, for Merlin's sake, Potter, we don't have time for this. Feed me Veritaserum then, if you must," Draco replied. Pacifying Potter was not his idea of a good time. Not if Bellatrix was still out there.

Potter was silent for a long while. He picked up a few sugar packets and arranged them on the table absent-mindedly. "Alright, let's say I believe you. So what do we do now?"

"What happened to Hermione?"

"She's at St. Mungo's. The wound wasn't bad, but they're checking her over because of the pregnancy."

Draco took a breath. "Lord Voldemort has a healer on his payroll."

Potter's hand paused. "What do you mean?"

"I mean he can get Bellatrix in. I mean, as long as Hermione is at St. Mungo's, she's vulnerable." He took a breath. "We can use that. Does she have Aurors guarding her?"

Potter nodded. "I called for Dawlish and Tonks outside the room. Why?"

"Outside the room is too little. We need someone _inside,_" Draco replied the beginnings of another plan already forming in his mind.

* * *

At three in the morning, a healer unusually intent on concealing her face entered the hospital room of Hermione Granger. The two Aurors had accepted a cup of coffee from another healer. Unfortunately they had missed the slight aftertaste of a sleeping draught and were both slumped over in chairs, their minds far in the dreamland. The healer went straight to the bed, pulled out her wand and aimed, her mouth forming the spell.

The body in the bed shifted fast and a shield was cast with such force it not only deflected the spell but also threw the attacker straight back into the wall. Bellatrix, for that was the healer, fired a cutting spell at the bed forcing the occupant to dodge. He raised his wand and cast another spell, missing Bellatrix by an inch. Bellatrix headed for the door and was halfway down the corridor before another spell knocked her off her feet and wrapped her up in cords.

Draco rose up from the chair he'd been waiting in, outside the room, his wand trained on the downed witch. Auror Potter rushed out of the ward and cast another spell, binding the witch even more. "We got her!" he declared.

"We did." echoed Draco, calming his beating heart as Bellatrix stared up at him. He was just then realizing that his aunt had seen his face. He had just declared open war where previously he'd been Lord Voldemort's enemy only in secret.

"And you weren't a traitor," Potter had the good taste to look apologetic. He glanced down at his shoes. "I'm sorry, I accused you. Turns out you—"

"Were just an impatient git?" Draco cut in.

Potter looked up at him as if checking if he was indeed joking. When he got over his shock, he smiled. "Your words, not mine."

Draco nodded back. He hadn't thought he'd need the apology but it felt good. Maybe caring about what Potter thought wasn't that bad after all. "So now what?"

"We arrest her."

"And me, Potter?"

Potter hesitated for a second. "You hurt her, I'll gut you. You know that, don't you?"

"Know? I remember you doing that at Hogwarts," Draco replied, this time with less spite in his voice.

Potter seemed a bit disgusted with himself but nodded. "Yeah, I was sorry about it then. I won't be if you hurt her." He took a breath. "You should go now. Before the other Aurors show up. Bellatrix knows you're working against Lord Voldemort but the others don't. We can stop her from talking."

"And the others are still a threat to everyone."

"Everyone and Hermione," Potter replied.

"If you'll worry about everyone else, I will worry about Hermione," Draco replied. He hesitated for another second then took a breath, added: "Later, Potter" and headed for the side door.


End file.
